“The Mermaid’s Daughter," by Ann Claycomb, is available now.

The story of the Little Mermaid gets a dark and grown-up makeover in “The Mermaid’s Daughter.”

Kathleen, a talented soprano studying opera, has suffered from troubling ailments her entire life; needle-like pain in her feet, burning in her mouth and bouts of depression. Her mother suffered similar symptoms and ultimately drowned when Kathleen was just a baby.

Doctors are baffled by Kathleen’s strange symptoms, and the only thing that helps soothe her pain is water, especially from the sea.

Her girlfriend Harry, also an opera singer, and her composer father both fear she’ll end up like her mother, and the quest to find answers takes Kathleen and Harry to her birthplace in Ireland.

From the title of Ann Claycomb’s novel, and the mythology that’s gradually revealed to us, we learn pieces of the truth of Kathleen’s plague before she does. Like several generations of women before her, she’s destined to either murder her lover or take her own life at a young age.

“The Mermaid’s Daughter” is a beautifully written and captivating read.

Claycomb’s use of the fairy tale is deft and enchanting. Drawing on Hans Christian Andersen’s original story, she also adds a unique Irish twist. Her incorporation of opera is also impressive, as she manages to make scenes from the stage come alive beautifully on the page.

She also cleverly switches perspectives throughout the story, from Kathleen to Harry to Kathleen’s father — and, occasionally, to the mysterious sea witches who were responsible for this curse.

Sometimes we feel Kathleen’s own pain and panic; at other moments we see how much her loved ones wish they could help her, and how helpless they feel.

Those familiar with Andersen’s “The Little Mermaid” know that it’s much darker than the Disney version, and Claycomb stays true to that mode for much of the book. “The Mermaid’s Daughter” is quite bleak and serious at times, as Kathleen’s fate seems desperate and hopeless.

At other times, it seems like it’s going to be too pat. But this book ends up being a satisfying emotional journey, one that’s heart-wrenching and also a little magical.